Ululating for “Safety”

Guest Post by Eric Peters

The latest?

Uncle wants to require that hybrid and electric cars be fitted with devices that make them noisy, so that the blind will be aware of their presence.

See here.

Apparently, there is an epidemic of blind – er, visually impaired – people being run over by silent-running hybrid and electric vehicles.

Well, no.

-----------------------------------------------------
It is my sincere desire to provide readers of this site with the best unbiased information available, and a forum where it can be discussed openly, as our Founders intended. But it is not easy nor inexpensive to do so, especially when those who wish to prevent us from making the truth known, attack us without mercy on all fronts on a daily basis. So each time you visit the site, I would ask that you consider the value that you receive and have received from The Burning Platform and the community of which you are a vital part. I can't do it all alone, and I need your help and support to keep it alive. Please consider contributing an amount commensurate to the value that you receive from this site and community, or even by becoming a sustaining supporter through periodic contributions. [Burning Platform LLC - PO Box 1520 Kulpsville, PA 19443] or Paypal

-----------------------------------------------------
To donate via Stripe, click here.
-----------------------------------------------------
Use promo code ILMF2, and save up to 66% on all MyPillow purchases. (The Burning Platform benefits when you use this promo code.)

Hard data is hard to come by, but I did find a 2009 National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) Technical Report (here) on the subject. According to this document, over a seven year period (2000-2007) a nationwide tsunami of 72 pedestrians were “involved” in crashes with hybrid-electric vehicles. Another 48 bicyclists were struck by a hybrid or electric car (or the reverse) over the same period.

The study does not break down how many of the 77 were blind.

I assume none of the 48 cyclists were.

I could not find more recent data, but unless there has been a surge in the number of blind people being flattened by hybrids and electric cars, it is probably still a very small number. Probably under 100… out of a population of about 320 million.

But the individual cases, when they do occur, make for highly combustible oh-the-humanity media coverage. Just as the individual cases of a sail fawn-gabbling parent inadvertently backing their car over a toddler did – and became the justification for a new mandate requiring that all new cars be fitted with closed-circuit cameras built into the rear bumper and an LCD monitor up front. Notwithstanding, by the way, that the view rearward as seen this way is inferior to the view one gets by looking back there using one’s own eyes. Which have depth perception and can also see things on the periphery – which the cameras can’t.

Now, the safety jihadis are ululating that the hundreds of thousands of hybrid and electric cars sold annually be fitted with noisemakers – specifically, waterproof speakers, which will produce some sort of faux IC engine sound, at an estimated cost to the car industry (that is, to you and me) of $23 million in the first year – because perhaps 72 blind people have either been run over by – or walked into – a hybrid or electric car.

The latter in italics for good reason.

Just as as backing up over a child arguably involves negligence on the part of the parent/driver (shouldn’t parents of toddlers be obliged to be aware where their toddlers are before putting the gear selector into Reverse?) so also the assignation of at least some of the blame for incidents “involving” the blind and hybrid-electric cars lies with the the blind themselves.

Pu another way: Should blindness absolve the blind person from taking care to not place his body in the path of a hybrid or electric car?

Why should it be entirely up to the owner of the hybrid-electric car to not only pay attention to his driving and exercise due care, but also to pay for an annoying sound-maker to alert a jaywalking or oblivious blind person to the presence of his vehicle? If the blind person is crossing the street legally, then traffic – hybrid and otherwise – will be stopped.

If, on the other hand, the jaywalker is crossing against traffic, which has the legal right-of-way, how is it the hybrid or electric car driver’s fault if the blind guy suddenly appears in his path?

In any case, this whole business is much ado about very little.

A very expensive much ado.

Despite the minimal – the almost nonexistent – actual body count, NHTSA is arguing that a hypothetical 2,800 pedestrian and cyclist injuries (not deaths) would be avoided by imposing $23 million in first-year implementation costs on the car industry.

That is, on car buyers.

NHTSA – government, generally – loves to confect victims in the absence of actual ones. It helps to justify the jihad. The VW “cheating” thing is another case in point. But at least that “involved” hundreds of thousands of cars.

It’s slightly embarrassing to insist that $23 million be spent – that is, imposed – on the car industry, on car buyers, because fewer than a 100 actual people (a fraction of whom are blind people) over a seven-year period have had some kind of unfortunate interaction with a hybrid or electric car.

But let’s say it is the “2,800” postulated by NHTSA.

The cost per incident is still astronomical. Lives are infinitely valuable to those who possess them. But imposing infinite costs for the sake of others’ lives is is economically insensate. The fact is we do place a value on lives – ours as well as others.

This is called cost-benefit analysis.

Certainly, it is tragic when a blind person is struck by a car – hybrid or otherwise. But $23 million to prevent it?

Paying attention would be a lot cheaper.

13
Leave a Reply

avatar
  Subscribe  
Notify of
Iska Waran
Iska Waran

I thought the whole point of buying an electric car was being able to sneak up on people – the blind and the cell phone-obsessed – and scare the living shit out of them.

Juandonjuan
Juandonjuan

With the DC Current available thru the electric/hybrid drive power supply you could hook up an awesome horn– like something off a diesel electric locomotive. Levitation for amateurs

Yancey Ward
Yancey Ward

What about the deaths of all the deaf pedestrians? Shouldn’t every car come with several flashing lights going all the time to save them?

Iska Waran
Iska Waran

Kurt Eichenwald would have a seizure and prosecute.

Jason Calley
Jason Calley

Hey Yancey! Flashing lights? Noise makers? That is just silly!

On the other hand, if we could just equip every car with a flexible plastic cow-catcher on the front… Yeah! That’s the ticket!

travis
travis

Liberals fucking democrats with stupid rules for stupid cars. Christmas wish fulfilled.

Uncle Charley

Over that same period, how many blind people were run over by regular noise making gas powered cars? My guess the number per 100000 miles is about the same.

AC
AC

They’ll need to put an assortment of flashing lights on top of these cars, too. Maybe some high power lasers, as well. To save all the deaf people that would otherwise be run over.

Remember, no amount of our money is too much for the government to spend on some half-assed idea dreamed up by an isolated leftist bureaucrat of middling intellect, while on his way to Comet Ping Pong for buy-one-get-one-free kids night.

Arc
Arc

They have wanted noise devices in cars for the last decade, I’ll stick to loud trucks.

Boat Guy
Boat Guy

Fuck all these scatterbrained leftist fools , their mission in life is to come up with simple minded shit to irritate the rest of us while fines and fees fund their otherwise worthless existence ! Like the VW diesel debacle , one of the finest lean burning efficient Diesel engines ever designed so because our criminal class in congress were so deep in the tank on the gasoline/alcohol debacle costing billions and waisting more fuel than it saves they pushed the pollution standards to the stratosphere after VW was in full production mode so the end run with soft wear to meet the bullshit law designed to fund a program the congress subsidized with billions was VW’s ditch effort option . Why not , fight congressional crimanal class with their own medicine “crime” ! Thanks to the alcohol for fuel we the American public have spent billions in extra fuel expense and have been restricted from diesel technologies for our smaller trucks and SUV’s in the LAND OF THE FREE / HOME OF THE HEAVILY RESTRICTED AND REGULATED . We have allowed ourselves to be ruled by people who’s mission in life is to maintain a subservient class going nowhere at great expense ! As for the noise maker for electric cars , give me a fucking break you low life parasites !

Doug Huffman

Some late model BMW’s pipe engine noise into the cabin so the owner can enjoy his expensive engine sounds. I gotta admit I like my 6,000# twin-turbo DIESEL BMW’s exhaust note.

Anon
Anon

I swear, we are becoming like the movie Demolition Man in this country. Pretty soon, we will be listening to the jingles of old commercials, and not able to have physical contact for sex as well. What the hell ever happened to real cars, you know, cars with engines. Prius is already the universal symbol for leftist liberal (or a completely emasculated man). The Prius recently took the top spot from the minivan as the car most feared to be seen in by any real American male. This is just another reason why I believe Hitlery lost the election. The Obamacare ad a couple of years ago, showing “pajama boy” stayed in the memory of even the dullest of men, and there was genuine fear from these men of being doomed to a world of wall to wall Prius, and arrogant “important” feminized men everywhere, forcing their stupid down their throats at gunpoint. Like Detroit with queers everywhere. Imagine that….

Børge Naboøyer Samarbeidsavtalen
Børge Naboøyer Samarbeidsavtalen

I had thought of this idea years ago,

The concept was to reproduce a nice hot rod engine sound, from your cars stereo system,
and then you would not need to own a V8 to sound like you owned a V8.

this would be very popular with the kids who like to soup up their hondas and toyotas,
and spend gobs of money on 1000w stereos with sub woofers, that you can hear two blocks away.

I should have patented the idea.

now all the souped up hondas and toyotas sound like a food processor filled with rocks.

Discover more from The Burning Platform

Subscribe now to keep reading and get access to the full archive.

Continue reading